Case Description
Plaintiff States sought damages and injunctive relief, alleging that 32 foreign and domestic insurers, reinsurers, brokers and trade organizations conspired to eliminate ‘long-tail’ risk coverage from Commercial General Liability and Property Insurance by manipulating the Insurance Service Office standardized form development process, and by defendant companies boycotting other insurers to reduce the availability of commercial general liability insurance to public entities. The parties agreed to settlement terms. The defendant insurers agreed to a 5 year injunction and a settlement sum of $36 million. Of the settlement, $21 million was used to create the Public Entity Risk Institute, a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing training, education, and technical services to public entity risk pools, self-insureds, policyholders and small business groups. Another $5.2 million was used to fund a public entity risk database, providing information for better risk management decisions. The majority of the remaining award was used to pay litigation costs and attorneys fees.
